1. Strategic Pretence or Strategic Defence? Britain, France and the Common Security and Defence Policy after Libya
- Author:
- Julian Lindley-French
- Publication Date:
- 04-2011
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- With British and French aircraft undertaking most of the air operations over Libya and some fiftyfive years on from the Suez debacle, historical irony abounds. On November 2 2010, London and Paris agreed the Defence and Security Cooperation Treaty1 (see box below). On the face of it the accord is by and large military-technical: to develop co-operation between British and French Armed Forces, to promote the sharing and pooling of materials and equipment including through mutual interdependence, and leading to the building of joint facilities. This it is hoped will promote mutual access to each other's defence markets, through the promotion of industrial and technological co-operation. But what has the treaty to do with the European Union (EU) and the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP)? Does the treaty mark the first step on the road to regalvanising Europe's strategic defence or is it simply the strategic pretence of two aging, failing powers unable to accept a world that has moved on?
- Topic:
- NATO, Democratization, Regime Change, and Insurgency
- Political Geography:
- Britain, France, Libya, Arabia, and North Africa